World Bank supports Poland’s climate-friendly flagship program

The World Bank will lend €250 million to Poland to help the country improve its air quality and energy efficiency. This financing was approved on Wednesday by the World Bank Group’s Board of Executive Directors, who represent the institution’s shareholders.

In this new project, the World Bank will support the scale-up of the Clean Air Priority Program. The program offers assistance and incentives to owners of single-family buildings that rely on old, polluting boilers to replace them with cleaner, more efficient installations, and get their houses insulated. It is implemented by the Polish Ministry of Climate and Environment and the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management (NFOŚiGW) in cooperation with 16 regional funds. It is the largest air quality and energy efficiency program in Europe, expected to cover three million households and significantly improve air quality, whilst generating tangible benefits for health, environment, and climate.

“In partnership with the Polish institutions and the European Commission, we helped lay the foundation for a universal, nationwide initiative for air quality improvement in Poland three years ago. Now we are reinforcing our cooperation, with a combination of financial and technical support designed to strengthen the Clean Air Priority Program. Our ambition over the next five years of our partnership is to support both the decarbonization of the heating sector as well as the program’s inclusion and pace,” Gallina A. Vincelette, World Bank Country Director for the European Union, said.

(WBJ)